Aid Delayed To Bosnia`s Children

November 02, 1992|By Thom Shanker, Chicago Tribune.

SARAJEVO, BOSNIA-HERZEGOVINA — The start of the United Nations-sponsored ``week of tranquility`` to get winter supplies to 1 million children in the war zone was undermined Sunday by fighting in central Bosnia and by a political conflict over the source of the aid shipment.

Officials of the Muslim government in Sarajevo rejected part of the first winter aid convoy because the goods were purchased from Serbian factories.

The Sarajevo officials decided to keep blankets, soy milk and food, but sent back Serbian-made shoes and clothes needed by 85,000 children trapped by the Serbian siege.

A UN official said he regretted the decision to reject part of the shipment brought in early Sunday by five trucks. But, he said, ``We understand their sensibilities.``

The spokesman said the clothing will be replaced this week with items not manufactured in Serbia.

The ``week of tranquility`` began, for Sarajevan Ivana Crlojvic, with two sniper shots through her kitchen window while she was eating breakfast early Sunday.

Her apartment is opposite a Serbian position overlooking the Bosnian capital`s Jewish cemetery, the scene of intermittent fighting throughout the day.

``It`s just another Yugoslav cease-fire,`` she said as she surveyed a downtown thoroughfare.

As about 300,000 besieged residents prepare for the harsh Balkan winter, the first UN convoy of blankets, heavy children`s coats and vaccine arrived in Sarajevo Sunday to start the ``week of tranquility.``

``Children are the principal victims of most civil conflicts,`` said James Grant, executive director of UNICEF. ``There is a new urgency to the situation here-the advent of winter. Winter is the enemy of children of all faiths and nationalities.``

The goal of UNICEF`s ``week of tranquility`` is to begin ``winterizing``

1 million children throughout the war zone.

UNICEF hopes to distribute by the end of November 200,000 sets of blankets, tons of high-protein biscuits and enough measles vaccines to inoculate all 85,000 children thought to remain in Sarajevo.

Ten UNICEF trucks left Belgrade, the Yugoslav capital, on Halloween, the night in America when children traditionally raise money for that UN organization.

The convoy was briefly halted by reports of fighting outside Zvornik, on the Drina River that forms the border between Serbia and Bosnia.

The convoy unloaded some trucks in Pale, the capital of the self-declared republic of Bosnian Serbs.

Early Sunday, the remaining trucks entered Sarajevo to the sounds of automatic weapons, mortars and artillery.